Mar 15

A Bouncing Bundle of Baseball Thoughts

By Jordi Scrubbings Baseball, Guns, Questions, Sports 3 Comments »

(I know what you are thinking, “Hey, didn’t you say less sports, more randomness over here? I don’t want to keep reading about baseball, basketball, and pro wrestling. Jeez.”

Patience, young grasshopper. You will be rewarded.)

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baseball_digest_dec72

Last month, I faced a big dilemma. I received my last issue in my subscription to Baseball Digest. I have been getting Baseball Digest since late 1986, since I was 9 years old and the magazine featured Sid Fernandez and Mike Scott.

Recently, however, the powers that be at Baseball Digest have changed the magazine quite a bit. It not only looks different, but they also only publish six times a year, instead of monthly as they have for 60 years. And they started including articles on fantasy baseball. I seriously thought about not renewing. It wasn’t the same magazine.

But I renewed for one more year. We’ll see after that.

Anyway, my latest issue featured their annual necrology, or list of all the baseball-related people who died in the past 365 days. I’ve written before about my odd fascination with the Baseball Digest necrology. I don’t know why, but I read all the obituaries in the article, all 30 of them.

This year, inspired by the Nick Adenhart tragedy, Baseball Digest published a sidebar article with list of players who died while active in their baseball careers. They listed players such as Joe Kennedy, Darryl Kile, Steve Olin, and of course, Roberto Clemente.

(Here is a similar list in the ESPN.com archives. There are a few names not on the Baseball Digest list.)

Surprisingly, there were a lot of names I never heard of. And a few ballplayers who died from some really strange causes.

Did you know in 1932, Red Sox pitcher Ed Morris was killed during a fight at a Florida fish fry?

Did you know Reds catcher Willard Hersberger committed suicide in 1940 after “blaming himself for two consecutive Cincinnati defeats”?

And finally, in 1935, Brooklyn Dodgers outfielder Len Koenecke was killed when he was hit in the head by a fire extinguish swung by an airplane pilot while the flight was in the air. Apparently, soon after take off, Koenecke began interfering with the duties of the pilot and co-pilot. There was an in-flight scuffle and Koenecke was subdued in the most violent of manners.

(TheDeadballEra.com has all the newspaper clippings from the incident posted on their site. I highly recommend taking a look. Actually that whole site is phenomenal. It is entirely dedicated to the deaths of baseball players.)

Whereas we still lose the ballplayers to heart attacks, car accidents, or the occasional gun shot, I doubt we will see another tragedy like Len Koenecke’s for a long time.

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Thought #2:

Is there a correlation between bad teams and lack of home runs during the steroid era (approximately 1990-2004)?

Did the teams with the worst records during the steroid era have the lowest home runs per season average?

I’m sure I could do the research, but I’m guessing the best teams during that era hit the most home runs. Teams like the Pirates, Royals, (Devil) Rays, and probably even the Mets lacked the budget or front office smarts to benefit from the steroid era. During a time when marginal semi-stars such as Bret Boone and Todd Hundley were considered legitimate power hitters, smart teams had to know something was going on. Teams like the Yankees had the wallet and the wherewithal to take advantage and sign numerous chemically enhanced sluggers.

I’m guessing  there was a clear relationship between home runs and wins during the steroid era. Since home runs equaled wins, and steroids equaled home runs, those teams who did not win regularly between 1990 and 2004 probably didn’t have too many players who were on the cheating side of science.

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Mar 08

Strength, Creativity, Science, and Numbers in Baseball and Basketball

By Jordi Scrubbings Baseball, Basketball, Sports 5 Comments »

If you have read my sports stuff for any amount of time, you would know baseball and basketball are my favorite sports. I like the pitchers, the catchers, a day at the park – my favorite baller was John Starks (that’s my tribute to Kurtis Blow, by the way).

Although I’ve been a big fan of both sports, I only played organized baseball, and only then up to age 14.

(I did make my 6th grade basketball team. How, I don’t know, but I did. Sadly, I was cut before the first game. If I remember right, I missed one too many practices before the season even began. That was 1988. Practice? I was Iverson before Iverson was Iverson.)

Anyway, one of the things I’ve learned in the last few years by reading great blogs and talking to people is that if you never played a sport, you can never really understand what’s occurring on the field, court, or other playing surface.

With that in mind, or rather with the experience of playing basketball not in mind, or with the inexperience of playing basketball in mind, here are some thoughts on how baseball and basketball compare to each other.

(In all honesty, some of this post was written over two years ago, back in the “compare basketball to Jazz” phase of the sports blogosphere. That theory has been so overused and overanalyzed that even one of its originators, Bethlehem Shoals of FreeDarko.com thinks it is cliché.)

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400px_Basketball1Even the most casual fan of music knows the difference between the performance of music by mechanical rote and music played by improvisation.  It is the difference between the calculated routine of an orchestra and the raw emotion of an old bluesman.  Although both show musical ability and captivate the listener in their own way, their methodologies reveal a dichotomy in music between precision and feeling, accuracy and improv, calculation and creation, science and art.

These differences can also be seen in sports, particularly in the basic underlying premises of baseball and basketball.  Whereas baseball is admired for its strategy, planning, physics, and mathematical analysis, basketball is quite the opposite, admired more for its spontaneity, creation, and freedom.

(This is of course changing rapidly as front office folks and more and more fans jump feet-first into the statistical analysis world baseball fans have been in for the last 30 years.)

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For as long as there have been baseball fans, there have been baseball statistics. Ever since Harry Chadwick started keeping score, baseball fans have been enamored with numbers. Wins, losses, batting averages, hitting streaks, home runs, strike outs, speeds, and distances have been associated with the game since the first pitch.

Basketball is different. It doesn’t have the long lasting relationship with numbers that baseball has. Basketball fans are more thrilled by the performance than the result. It is the spectacle of action, the awe of movement. Granted, there are historical numbers, such as Wilt Chamberlain’s 100-point game, Michael Jordan’s 63-point playoff performance, or maybe even Scott Skiles’s 30-assist game, but they pale in historical depth to the numbers of baseball legend.

Because of its association with numbers, baseball as always seemed more scientific to me than basketball.  Baseball is the “Science of Pitching” and “Science of Hitting”.  Although I am sure there are numerous books on how to shoot a basketball, I’ve never heard of the the “Science of Shooting” or the “Science of Dribbling”.

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Throughout the history of baseball, those who achieve the highest levels of success have been those who have mastered the science of the game. One of the best examples of a baseball “scientist” is future Hall of Famer Greg Maddux.  Despite Maddux’s inability to strike out every hitter, he made a successful career of deceiving hitters through ballspeed variance and movement.  On the other side of the spectrum is pitchers like Detroit Tiger Joel Zumaya, whose brute strength (when healthy) enables him to make a living overwhelming hitters with his 100 mph fastball.  Falling between Zumaya and Maddux are hundreds of pitchers, some successful and some not, who utilize both the science of strength and the science of aerodynamics to varying degrees.

For batters as well, baseball is describable through the science of physics.  As making contact is at the heart of basic hitting, numerous batters throughout history have studied the science of procedure as to ensure hit placement.  These hitters such as Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs, Pete Rose, and currently Ichiro Suzuki, use the spin of the pitch to determine where to guide the ball during the hit. As with pitching, there are also those whose brute strength has elevated them to success.  Hitters such as the legendary Babe Ruth and not-so-legendary Rob Deer have used their ability to hit a baseball a long distance as a way to continue their careers.

Basketball is of course not without its physics. There are plenty of trajectories. There is the shot, the arc, the leaping, the angles of the rebound, and the reaction of a blocked shot. Many rebounders, such as the legendary Dennis Rodman, have used science-like precision to determine angles and timing, not unlike the mound calculations of Greg Maddux.

But basketball is based much more on freedom. The freedom to move left or right, front or back. The freedom to accelerate or slow down. The freedom to create your offense through arm and leg motions that make even the most liberal coach cringe. You can’t improv a home run. You can throw a little zazz into a dunk.

lil-giantsBasketball is not without its brute strength either. But braun in basketball is far different than braun in baseball. Like baseball’s speed, basketball’s strength is  a segment of the game falls opposite of the majority of the sport. For basketball, the strength, power, and science most often seen in baseball are evident in plays near the basket. Like Ruth and McGwire in baseball, many large basketball players such as Shaquille O’Neal and Dwight Howard and have used their size and strength as a weapon, overpowering their smaller contemporaries and dunking the ball directly in the basket.

Although a majority of baseball relies on physics and its resulting actions, there is one aspect of baseball that does not confine itself to the rules of science: fielding.  Fielding is more often than not a routine of basic movements, conditioned by practice to position individuals at the right place at the right time.  However, when the ball is batted or thrown off its usual trajectory, fielders must make non-routine movements to catch or throw the ball.  These movements – the leaping catch over the fence, the dive in the hole to field a groundball, the jump over or around a runner to make a throw – make fielding more of an art than a science.  Defensive experts such as the legendary Ozzie Smith or, more recently, Omar Vizquel, or any of the other great fielders in baseball history have often displayed a level of immeasurable improvisation and a knack for getting to the ball and ensuring it gets to where it needs to go.

If fielding can be considered artful, then it is no coincidence that it is the last frontier of baseball statistical analysis. And it is no coincidence either that baseball fielding and basketball are becoming statistical at the same time.

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Feb 22

A Blast from the Past: The Best Sports Blogs of 2003

By Jordi Scrubbings Best of the Basement, Blogs, Links, Lists, Sports No Comments »

bloggersWhile perusing the ‘net the other day, I came upon a spectacular website. Apparently, in 2003 Forbes did a “Best Blogs” series, and one of the segments they decided to profile was the at-the-time sparse sports blogosphere. If SportsByBrooks, Deadspin.com, and The Big Lead were the Columbus, DeSoto, and Cortes of the sports blogging scene (explorers as well as conquerers), then these blogs were the ancient Vikings setting foot in an uncharted, untamed, and unpopulated New World.

Right from the start, Forbes discusses the difficulty of compiling their list. Their thought was that because ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Fox News, and regional sports sections provided ample coverage, then there was no reason for sports fans to blog. On top of that, there was “no economic incentive to start a sports blog”.  I guess for Forbes that’s all that counts.

Before I review their Top 5, here is perhaps my favorite line from Forbes’s intro:

“Pro football and basketball blogs are the worst of the bunch–the pickings are slim, the presentation is poor and the writing uninspired.”

Number 1: Badjocks.com

2003 Forbes description highlight: “a good-looking, fun and informative blog that offers a Kobe Watch, a tally of high school coach sex scandals and the main attraction, stories listed under the heading “Who Did Something Stupid Today?” With 3,000 daily visits, the site may feature a story on a gold medal Russian rhythmic gymnast who was arrested for cheating at cards, or a high school mascot waving the Confederate flag.”

2010 Follow up: Badjocks.com is still active and was recently named one of the most influential blogs of the decade by Sports Illustrated.

Number 2: Off Wing Opinion

2003 Forbes description highlights: “There’s very little sports news that Eric McErlain won’t take an opinionated whack at … The Reston, Va., resident supplies an impressively informed point of view on every topic he targets … he gets 200 to 300 visitors a day.”

2010 Follow-up: Currently located at the more convenient www.offwing.com, Off Wing Opinion is still active, although it is now apparently only updated once a week as McErlain has seized bigger and better media opportunities.

Number 3: FanBlogs.com

2003 Forbes description highlights: “Fanblogs.com is probably the best blog dedicated to a single sport–college football … Making Fanblogs profitable is not on the agenda, they say, though they would like to make enough to cover the costs of producing the site. The blog got an average 17,000 daily hits this month.”

2010 Follow-up: FanBlogs.com is still active and looks as popular as ever. In 2006, it was purchased by Rivals.com, which makes it a part of the extensive Yahoo! Sports network.

Number 4: F#%!edsports.com

2003 Forbes description highlights: “F#%!edsports.com is sports’ version of King Lear’s fool. Buddy Maguire comments on the day’s major scandals … Although he claims to have earned a whopping $8.05 from the site so far, it’s the grotesque, not the money, that fuels him.”

2010 Follow-up: I’m not sure what to think here. When I typed in “F#%!edsports.com there was no site. However, when I looked up “Buddy Maguire”, I found a site called FrostedSports.tv which has not been updated since October 2008. Either way, I’m going to say they are not active anymore. Maybe someone out there knows something different.

Number 5: Replacement Level Yankee Fan

2003 Forbes description highlight: “Larry Mahnken’s Replacement Level Yankees has a pretty, pinstriped design, in-depth opinions updated regularly and relevant stats … The site is slowly gaining popularity, drawing about 1,000 hits in May, 2,000 in June, 3,000 in July and 6,500 in August.”

2010 Follow-up: On April 2nd, 2007 Replacement Level Yankee Fan moved from its original location to www.replacementlevel.com. That web address however redirects to Revenge of the RLYW which picks up on March 15, 2008. It’s almost as if the Yankees didn’t exist for 11 months.

Overall, I have to give credit to these guys. Not only are they the forebearers of the sports blogging scene, but as a writer/blogger who has been on the scene for 3.5 years, I have to tip my cap to the writers at 4 out of 5 of these sites who continue to post quality material day in and day out.

Seven years is a long time. Great job, guys.

(Addendum: In 2004, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer wrote an article on the growing sports blog scene. According to the P-I, at the time there were “322 blogs, with 267 dedicated to baseball. Some have become so popular, they are selling advertising.”)

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Feb 08

Rezball and Rasslin’: Regional cultural nuances in sports

By Jordi Scrubbings Baseball, Culture, Musings, Pro Wrestling, Sports 1 Comment »

Thoughts on sports and their different regional “flavors”:

I’ve always been interested in how different areas put their own twists on sports. A game played by the same rules can be played in totally different ways and interpreted in a completely different manner by different cultures.

But why? What is it about certain cultures that drives changes in the game?

rezball2A few years ago I noticed several articles that discussed a style of basketball being played in the American southwest by young Native Americans. Dubbed “Rezball“, it was basketball played at an extremely fast pace. According to ESPN.com,

Rezball is a smashmouth game of speed, aggression and stamina. Full-court presses and man D are applied relentlessly, but the transition game is the game. Guards often start a break after receiving the inbounds pass; set plays are rare. Rezball makes the 2007 Suns look like the 1995 Knicks. Squads with three guys taller than 6′3″ are rare, so even the short guys know how to play big, and all five positions boast guardlike handles and shooting skills. Watching the best teams will rivet you to your seat—from the way players improvise at warp speed to their sheer endurance and the dialed-in-but-carefree way they ball.

For some reason, Native Americans decided to add an extreme element of speed to their game. Granted, height is not a usual trait in Native Americans, so few teams would have the option to slow down the game by throwing the ball to a lumbering big man underneath the basket. But from what I know about Rezball, it is faster than the Philippines Basketball Association, a league known to impose height requirements to give domestic players a chance.

So why did the Native Americans tweak basketball in that way? Is running or sprinting a typical habit of the people?

On the complete opposite side of the spectrum is the southern style of professional wrestling, known in some circles as “rasslin’”. According to Wikipedia,

Rasslin’ – refers to a southern style of professional wrestling which emphasizes kayfabe and stiffness, with fewer squash matches and generally longer feuds. It was synonymous with the NWA-affiliated promotions. Rasslin’ included TV tapings at smaller venues, as compared to the larger and more well-known arenas utilized by northern U.S. promotions such as the AWA and WWF/E. The term is derived from a phonetic spelling of how the word “wrestling” sounds when spoken with a heavy Southern accent. It is also commonly used in a derogatory manner by non-Southern wrestling fans to describe that style of wrestling.”

Southernxident(To be honest, although the description is correct, I have never heard anyone in Florida refer to it as “rasslin’”. Actually, due to the mixed population in Florida, I’ve been told the state is a very difficult place to wrestle in, because transplanted fans from different parts of the country look for different things in their wrestling performances.)

I’ve been told that “southern” professional wrestling is generally slower than its northern counterparts. In the definition above, “emphasizing kayfabe” means characters and stories have more of a role in southern pro wrestling matches. In order to build those stories and develop those characters, the action must be slower. No rapid, high-flyin’, biff-bang-boom-wham-bam-slam matches. In southern wrestling, each match tells a story and it is the story that is emphasized more so than the athletic performance.

So why is wrestling different in the South? What is it about southern culture that favors deliberate storylines over fast-paced action?

Having lived in the South for over 20 years, I can attempt to answer this. For the same reason country music is generally slower, and southern accents are not as fast as northern dialects, Southerners prefer a more laid back lifestyle. People are more spread out in the south and aren’t ingrained with the urgency of northern city folks.

There is also the notion that morals are more prevalent in the South. Whereas in the North, people are all jumbled together and no one knows which way is which, in the South, there are traditional codes of conduct – such as how a gentleman or lady should act. Pro wrestling storylines feed off of these ideas. Bad guys deliberately brake the codes of conduct and good guys get in the fans’ favor by giving these villains a helpin’ of fist-flyin’ justice.

Before I end, I would like to leave you with a few questions.

Questions: Could there have been at some point different nuances in baseball? Were there slight differences in baseball strategy when the game started its growth in America? Did southerners play a slower-paced game than northerners? Was the northern game the origin of homeruns and fastballs and the south the birthplace of off-speed pitches, setting up batters, and base-to-base offense? Could there have been a difference in regional pitching psychology? Also, was there a different style of game strategy in the Negro Leagues?

The best answers may win something from me, if I can think of a cool gift.

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Jan 18

Thoughts on being an overseas athlete

By Jordi Scrubbings Baseball, Basketball, International, Pro Wrestling, Skeeball, Sports No Comments »

(This post is similar but opposite to my post a few weeks ago on The Effect of the New Economy on Foreign Baseball Players. Whereas that one discussed teams changing their budgets and how it is effecting the acquisition of baseball players, this post will talk about my fantasy of leaving America to compete in a professional athletic organization.)

InterKoreanGames1999I have always had a fascination with being an American-born athlete in a foreign country. Back in 2007, when I was writing for the YAYSports basketball site, I wondered if I had what it takes to play basketball in Iceland. Then, on TheSeriousTip.com in 2008, I wrote about Chris Jefferies, a former Washington University of St. Louis basketball player who was playing ball in Argentina.

Maybe if I made it on a foreign basketball team, I could ball with some of the FSU hoops players I used to watch live when I was in school, guys like Jason Rich and Isaiah Swann, both of whom are playing in Israel, or Nigel “Big Jelly” Dixon, who is hooping it up in South Korea. How cool would be to live the life of professional basketball vagabond Paul Shirley, whose book “Can I Keep My Jersey?” has been recommended to me on numerous occasions (one of these days I will read it, I promise).

(By the way, a post I wrote on Nigel Dixon’s career up to 2007 was one of my more popular early posts. What can I say? The people loved the Big Jelly.)

Not only am I not the world’s best hoopster (hoopist? hoopineer?), but according to a recent report on ESPN’s True Hoop blog, it may be tough to pay the bills while playing international basketball. Apparently, several former NBA players, to include Damon Jones, Robert “Tractor” Traylor, and Travis Best, have openly stated that they haven’t been financially compensated on a regular basis.

This experience has become a fairly common one for NBA players who have been lured to Europe with lucrative contracts. Nenad Krstic and Jannero Pargo were among the players who returned to the NBA last season after not receiving payments from their European clubs.

Since I have bills to pay, basketball might not be the best way to fulfill my international athletic dreams. Not getting paid is not my thing.

What about other sports?

Even though my tryout with the Atlanta Braves back in 2001 didn’t go as planned, I still think I have a shot at being a professional baseball player. According to baseball-links.com, there are leagues in 38 nations. Remember Brandon Fraser in The Scout or Tom Selleck in Mr. Baseball? That could be me. I could be the next Tuffy Rhodes.

(Ironic tidbit about Rhodes: although he hit 477 home runs and is an all-time superstar in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball league, he is probably best known in the states for hitting only three. On his amazing opening day in 1994, off the Mets’ Dwight Gooden, Rhodes hit three homers, setting a record as the only Major League Baseball player to hit three HRs in his first three at-bats of the season. Unfortunately, he hit only 10 more in his six years in the bigs.)

Of course, if the international baseball thing doesn’t pay out – after all, if stateside teams aren’t exactly opening the coffers for a 32-year old lefty pitcher who couldn’t hit 70mph on the radar gun nine years ago, why should I expect an international team to? – I could try another venture.  As Jack Black showed in the classic cinematic masterpiece Nacho Libre, pro wrestling is quite the phenomenon outside of the US. According to the almighty Wiki, there are dozens of organizations in faraway lands such as Japan, Bolivia, Mexico, Australia, Ireland, Italy, and New Zealand.

Unfortunately, despite my pro wrestling fandom and “involvement” as a self-proclaimed superfan, I have no clue what to do in the ring. As a matter of fact, I have been in the ring a grand total of one time. A few years ago, when my curiosity into professional wrestling was slowly surfacing, I took up an invite to visit a couple of pro wrestlers during a training session. After they were done throwing each other around and exchanging grapples, they invited me into the ring.  Not only did I climb into the ring awkwardly, but everything I did was goofy. Needless to say, I got out before I got hurt.

You know, maybe I should reconsider this international athlete idea. Maybe I need to find something a little less physically demanding.

Do they play skeeball in other countries? I do like skeeball.

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Jan 07

When will the National Rifle Association offer to help sports leagues?

By Jordi Scrubbings Basketball, Football, Guns, Questions, Sports 2 Comments »

education_imgAlthough I am a supporter of the National Rifle Association, I am extremely critical of them. As I wrote a few weeks ago, I think they do a horrible job of reaching out to people outside of their stereotypical demographic. Unfortunately, because the NRA seemingly only targets (no pun intended) white, suburban/rural, middle class supporters, other groups outside their demographic are not usually influenced by the largest gun group in America. Although some may argue that the lack of the NRA’s influence is a good thing and that if given a larger role, the NRA would only promote the repeal of gun laws, I disagree. Along with being the foremost lobby group, the NRA is also the premiere gun education and safety organization in the US.

In the wake of the Gilbert Arenas gun debacle, the time is now for the NRA to reach out to organizations it doesn’t normally associate with. What the NRA should absolutely do is reach out to the NBA, NFL, MLB, and any other sports leagues and offer to teach instruction classes on safe and proper gun ownership, handling, and transport. This would benefit not only the athletes, but also the leagues and the NRA itself.

Benefit to athletes:

Overall, if the NRA would start teaching athletes the right way to handle guns, maybe we would start seeing less incidents such as those that occurred to Arenas, Sebastian Telfair, Stephen Jackson, Plaxico Burress, or former Cowboys head coach Barry Switzer.

(Wow. Check out what Switzer did back in 1997. According to reports, “a loaded .38-caliber revolver was found in his carry-on baggage at the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport.” I’m sure that’s impossible these days.)

If possible, the NRA should teach courses not only to active players now, but also as part of the indoctrination seminars leagues have for new players – where players are warned about groupies, instructed on finances, taught how to talk to the media, etc. This would lay the groundwork for a change in behavior. If the players opt not to own a gun, that’s their choice. But for those that do chose to own and carry, at least they are instructed the right way.

Benefit to the Leagues:

Currently the NBA and NFL have made statements and enacted policies that are fairly anti-gun. However, this has not stopped the flow of incidents. If the athletes aren’t listening to suggestions that they shouldn’t carry, then the leagues should implement courses to help them carry and own the right way. Allowing the NRA to instruct athletes would help the leagues. First and foremost, from a public relations perspective, it would hopefully reduce the number of embarrassing incidents. From a legal perspective, it may also give the leagues more leverage to use against a player if they do commit a crime with a gun. If a player attends a league-approved, NRA-taught course and still finds themselves on the wrong side of the law, the league could state the player was taught and hence should have known better.

(This would alleviate situations such as Arenas “not knowing” he couldn’t bring guns into the locker room or that he needed to follow the laws and guidelines of Washington, DC. Ignorance of the law, especially in this case, is almost laughable.)

Benefit to the NRA:

As I stated in the introduction, there is a definite benefit for the NRA to reach out and assist the NFL, NBA, and other sports leagues. Teaching athletes would expose the NRA to a brand new audience, to include many people who never heard of the organization. The NRA would also benefit from the positive press it would get for attempting to reduce high profile gun crime. If they promote themselves right, after they get an arrangement with one league, the positive press would lead to other leagues signing up, which would only continue to show the NRA in a positive light.

The NRA takes pride in its instructors. They are ambassadors of the organization. Nothing would benefit the NRA more than to showcase these instructors teaching the most high profile athletes in the world.

Epilogue: I emailed the NRA blog webmasters and asked them if they had or are planning to reach out to professional sports leagues. So far I have not received a response.

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Jan 03

My favorite lists of 2009

By Jordi Scrubbings Links, Music, Sports, Tampa No Comments »

2350216561_bef0951512Welcome to 2010. The year they name movies after. We are now officially in the future.

I have quite a few projects in the works for the next few weeks. Among them a few posts, maybe a few webcasts, and maybe even an appearance or two on other sites.

But, to kick off 2010, here are four of my favorite “Best of” list posts that were featured on the Web in the last week of 2009:

1) The Catchphrase of the Decade – Slate.com

As a big fan of wordplay and word patterns, I liked this article. Written by Ron Rosenbaum, it dissects a lot of the catchphrases, cliches, and jargon that we’ve used in the last 10 years. Because of overuse, many of these phrases, which may have started innocent enough, have lost their meaning. Among my favorites are “fifteen minutes of fame”, “under the bus”, and “out of the box”.

2) The Decade in Tampa Bay Music – Creative Loafing

I have no excuse for not knowing more about the Tampa Bay music scene. When I was in Tallahassee, I knew of almost every local band in town. For whatever reason, I haven’t gotten into supporting the Tampa Bay scene. I need to. Now thanks to Creative Loafing and writer Joran Oppelt, I have a great primer for knowing who’s who and what’s what locally.

3) The 2009 “Best Post” Blogging Retrospective – SteadyBurn.net

The folks over at SteadyBurn scoured the sports blogosphere to find what they considered the best of 2009. There are some really good posts in here too, although they focused mostly on the humorous, light-hearted, and irreverent side of the sports blogosphere.

4) Quotes of the Year 2009 – ESPN.com (h/t The Big Lead)

Lastly, from ESPN, here are the best sports quotes of 2009. I would have liked to see a “quotes of the decade” list. Personally, my favorite quote comes from basketball player Lorenzen Wright in 2006. When asked if he was worried if couldn’t win over all the fans of a new team, Wright replied,

“Some people are steak people and some people only like fish, if I am steak and they are fish people, they might not like me very much.”

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Dec 19

An Interview with Jay Busbee from Jan 2008

By Jordi Scrubbings Interviews, Social Media, Sports No Comments »

Like many artists, writers, and creative geniuses, I have tons of unpublished material. I have several binders of ideas, notions, poems, and half-written stories. Every once in a while, I’m going to dust one off and publish it here.

Here is an interview I did with blogger, author, and longtime e-migo Jay Busbee. Jay now writes regularly for Yahoo! at their NASCAR blog, From The Marbles, and their golf blog, Devil Ball Golf.  Before blogging at Yahoo!, he was one of the many sports bloggers plugging away at independent sites throughout the web.

Back in early 2008, I sent Jay a bunch of questions about independent sports blogging, the mainstream media, and the voice of the common fan. He was kind enough to answer, and now, nearly two years later, I’ve decided to publish his answers. Sorry about that, Jay.

When did you start blogging? Why?

I started throwing some thoughts up on my own personal site around the end of 2004. Nothing special there, just a bit of ranting, reviewing, and pimping whatever I’d published at the moment. I didn’t start a sports blog until October 2006, when I launched Sports Gone South. It was the confluence of multiple events, I was at something of a career crossroads, looking for a new angle on sportswriting; I’d just discovered Deadspin; and my agent and I were discussing how I should start raising my profile and creating more of a “brand name” for myself. I’d written the same way I write now on sports blogs for years; I used to do a game-picking column in college that was the same sort of riffing, using sports as a jumping-off point for whatever I felt like ranting about. So, part of starting blogging was for fun, and part was a (theoretically) canny career move. So far, so good; Sports Gone South led to a paying gig writing Right Down Peachtree, Atlanta magazine’s Atlanta-only sports blog. (RIP RDP, ed.)

Did you have any goals going into starting a blog, or was it primarily self-serving?

The goals at the beginning were pretty amorphous – get my name out there isn’t exactly a coherent business plan, you know? But once I got rolling on it, I started seeing what was possible out there. There’s no major sports blog devoted exclusively to Southern sports, so that’s what I’m working toward. What I think we’re seeing now is more of a niche, narrowcasting sort of approach. Blogs are taking a single mission – a single sport, a single team, a single aspect of the sporting universe – and becoming the established new-media expert on that sector. I think that’s going to be the best way to distinguish yourself going for ward; generalists can just get lost in the mix.

How would describe the mainstream media’s coverage of sports prior to you starting a blog?

Top-down. Not that it has anything whatsoever to do with my blog, but the mainstream sports media, like the political media, is realizing that fans/readers aren’t idiots, and in many cases possess more expertise than the often self-proclaimed “experts”. It’s not enough to give the scores alone, but if you want to go blathering on about some topic, you’d best be sure you’ve got something to say. I think the anonymity of the Internet gives bloggers an inherent distaste for the mindless self-promotion of certain media types. It’s the logical, though nauseating, outgrowth of New Journalism, where the journalist himself affects (and, in some cases, becomes) the story. The problem is, when the journalist in question isn’t particularly interesting, or doesn’t have much to say, you’re going to see readers clamoring for a return to the story itself – which is what blogs do.

Did MSM sports coverage have any effect on your idea to start a blog?

Indirectly. I think I started it right after one of the massively overhyped Red Sox-Yankees series – it was a regular-season one, not even a playoff – and I, like most of the rest of America west of the Hudson, was saying, “Enough of this crap. It’s a good rivalry, but it’s not the ONLY rivalry.” So my initial blog tagline was, “Really, haven’t we heard enough about the Yankees and Red Sox?” The problem with MSM, as with any powerful medium, is that the medium dictates the message. A bloop single in Yankee Stadium gets infused with more drama than a game-winning three-run homer in Tropicana Field. And that’s wrong, friends, wrong on so many levels.

What do you think made sports blogging popular?

It’s the old “sports bar” motif – when you’re at a sports bar, you want to talk, you don’t want to sit and listen to someone talk AT you. You want to rant, rave, joke, whine, laugh, the whole range of emotions. Blogs let you do that, and the best of ‘em allow readers to find like-minded folks and form a mini-community that assesses sports and life without having to be told THIS IS AN IMPORTANT GAME by some outside entity. Fight the power, man!

Are you surprised at all with the growth of the sports blogging community?

Not a bit. I think it’ll only grow as non-blogger-types start to realize, hey, there’s some cool stuff on this here Internet! I’m always amazed at how few people, relatively speaking, actually read sports blogs. I get links from Deadspin or whatever, and it’s a couple thousand hits at best. Then I get a link from Sports Illustrated, and it’s SEVENTY THOUSAND hits. And even that doesn’t encompass the entire fanbase, much of which is content to watch the games alone. Once blogging becomes more of a mainstream medium, not just in sports but in all media, you’ll see even more exponential growth.

What is more important to a blogger’s success: ease of technology (publishing, voice, etc) or quality of content?

I’d actually add “voice” as a third category to that question. It’s not enough to have something good to say, it has to be stated effectively in a blogging format: fast and funny/sharp/witty. But yes, you’ve got to have a quality presentation – courier font on a white background doesn’t cut it anymore. You need the mix of pictures, video, and content to keep the attention of the masses.

In the end, though, I think you have to have quality content to go the farthest. People will call you out if you screw up stats or mischaracterize their team – try talking trash about the Kentucky Wildcats and see what happens, for instance – so you’d better know your stuff.

How important is it to capture the voice of the “common” sports fan?

Not very. Matter of fact, I don’t think there is such a thing as the “common” sports fan. Some are interested in stats, others in stories, others in rumors. I don’t think there’s this amorphous mass of fans out there with one common voice or perspective. As with any creative endeavor, it’s essential you tell your own story in your own words. Write what you like, and the money (and readers) will follow. That’s an oversimplification, of course; you could write all day long about Mesopotamian kickball if you wanted and you probably still wont get many readers. But if you try to follow trends “hey, let’s talk about how the Patriots are like Britney Spears!?” your posts are going to be dead on arrival.

Do you think blogging has changed the presentation of sports coverage by the MSM in the last 5 years? If so, how?

Absolutely. We’ve knocked athletes off their pedestals, and that’s a good thing. Take a look at the way Fox Sports presents games now – you practically want to douse yourself in holy water and bow before the icons of Favre and Jeter. But these guys are idiots just like the rest of us – probably more so than the rest of us. Of course, the end result of this idol-knocking is paparazzi, so maybe that’s not a good thing. But I don’t think as many people WORSHIP athletes anymore, and that’s a good thing.

Could you call sports blogging a “revolution”? If so, has it succeeded? What needs to be done?

Absolutely, it’s a revolution. Real-time reaction to events, the elevation of the fan, it’s all useful. The problem is that there’s still an ingrained distrust of blogging in general – some from MSM journalists who perceive a threat or don’t want to deal with the added competition, some from readers who just don’t realize the level of talent that’s out there in the blogosphere. But what you’ll see in coming years is columnists and editors who grew up reading Deadspin and blogs, and don’t see it as “the new thing” but as just another element of the sports landscape. Bloggers will get credentials to games, and other fans will realize that blogging isn’t just pajama’d freaks in their mom’s basements.

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Dec 07

Is the lifespan of baseball players increasing?

By Jordi Scrubbings Baseball, Health, Questions, Sports 3 Comments »

Behold, my first sports-related post on JordiScrubbings.com. I told you I would talk sports over here on occasion. Not as often as on ye olde site, but sometimes.

090620-navarro-vlg-9p.widecAn interesting thought came to mind as I was reading an old issue of Baseball Digest. Every year, Baseball Digest publishes a necrology, listing all the people from baseball (players, owners, umpires, etc) who died in the past year. Each entry features a brief paragraph bio on the deceased’s baseball career as well as the deceased’s age. This time while reading I happened to queue in on a few of the advanced ages – 86, 89, 93, 91, 87, 92, etc. Even though there were a few tragic accidents and younger ballplayers listed, could the average baseball player be living longer?

We often hear a lot about great medical breakthroughs that prolong the life of the average person. According to the almighty Wikipedia, “record life expectancy has risen linearly for men and women” since 1840. Also in the 1840s, Alexander Cartwright codified the first “rules” of baseball – things such as 90ft between the bases, nine innings, etc. So therefore, one should expect the average lifespan of baseball players should then be consistently rising in accordance with the average person.

However, whereas the average lifespan of an American in 2009 is approximately 79, the average age of death of the major league personnel listed in Baseball Digest is barely over 75. This list includes not only former players, but also front office personnel, writers (former president of the Baseball Writers Association Neil Hohfeld was only 56), and announcers (former Braves announcer Skip Caray was only 68).

There is no doubt all sports put wear and tear on athletes’ bodies. The wear and tear is even worse with when athletes fill their bodies with steroids, human growth hormones, uppers, downers, “greenies”, or any other kind of non-prescribed medication. They are sacrificing their lives for performance, which of course equals financial gain or additional fame. I don’t hold it against them, that’s the cost (or perceived cost) of competition.

On the other hand, current athletes are prescribing to amazing diets, workout regiments, and lifestyles. They now take care of themselves year-round with the help of doctors, trainers, and fleets of other physical advisers. Could this emphasis on life and performance have an effect on overall lifespan? Or will the positives of diet and lifestyle be outweighed by the negatives of unhealthy performance enhancers? Of course, I suspect those with physically destructive behaviors would die first, and those who continue to live well to live longer. So it is very possible we could see a decrease in lifespan of baseball players as they as a group flush out those with negative behaviors.

I know I could very well answer my own question. Unfortunately, the research is too much work for my simple blogging self. It would require finding out who died when, how old they were, and then find the average death age per year across 160 years of baseball history. Of course, I fully expect their to be anomalies, so the idea of picking one year each decade wouldn’t work.

(By the way, I think if this study was extended to all athletes in the major American sports, the lifespan of baseball players would probably be the closest to the lifespan of an average American man. Basketball requires freakish genetics which may possibly have an effect on lifespan; football not only requires enormous bulk in the case of linemen, but also involves an extraordinary amount of brain-jarring collisions; and hockey is also a violent sport.)

(Image is of 103-yr old former Negro League ballplayer Emilio Navarro throwing out the first pitch at a 2009 game between the Oakland A’s and San Diego Padres.)

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Jul 20

Counterprogramming on the night of the ESPYs

By Jordi Scrubbings Sports, Television No Comments »

I have never been a big fan of award shows. I don’t watch the Oscars, the Tonys, the Emmys, the BET Awards, the CMT Awards, or any other WTF Awards show out there. Instead of being about the fans and the entertainment, award shows end up being industry love-fests where celebrities drool all over each other. And few, if any, of these awards shows are worse than ESPN’s ESPY awards.

Way back in day, I used to be excited about the ESPYs. I not only watched, but even taped the first ever ESPY award show. An award show that celebrates the best in sports over the last year? Sign me up. Then it began to pander to celebrities – actors and actresses and the like. No thanks.

So with my normal Sunday night routine of unwinding to baseball destroyed thanks to the ESPYs, I embarked on a channel surfing journey to find something interesting to watch. Admittedly, I am not an avid TV watcher and I don’t have any routine shows, so I was embarking into the vast programming unknown. Fortunately, I only had to travel less than a dozen channels before I landed on CNBC’s Marijuana Inc, an exposé on the pseudo-legal marijuana business in Northern California.

Now I am not going to push my opinion either way, nor admit or deny any prior usage, but I have always been interested in the weed business. Back in my college days, however, I used to play Dope Wars non-stop. Perhaps you remember that. Perhaps not.

Anyway, CNBC’s broadcast went behind the scenes in Northern California’s Mendocino County, a place where selling weed is a booming business and millions in marijuana money is brought into the local economy each year. Thanks to a tangled web of federal, state, and local laws, growers are allowed to grow, buyers are allowed to buy, and smokers are allowed to smoke. CNBC talked to cafe owners who sell out of storage areas, entrepreneurs who want to turn parts of Oakland into the second coming of Amsterdam, housewives who attend classes on how not to get caught selling, and the poor DEA and local authorities who are trying to restore order in this Mecca of Mary Jane.

After Marijuana, Inc ended, what to watch then was a no-brainer. The next show on CNBC was a similar expose on the porn industry entitled Porn: The Business of Pleasure. You can’t tell me the folks at CNBC didn’t know what they were doing, broadcasting two hours of content on two topics my demographic (18-35, male, single, and bored) love as much as sports. You are correct, CNBC, in lieu of sports, weed and women work just fine.

Although there were the expected images of bikini clad women throughout the broadcast, the porn business expose was not all about the T&A. Did you know the porn industry is worth over 13 billion dollars? Did you also know that adult DVD sales have dropped between 30 and 50% in the last few years? That’s what this show covered, the money, the people, and the technology behind the business of horizontal body banging.

All in all, it was an enjoyable night of television entertainment. I did find it interesting, however, that the host of the weed documentary was casually dressed in jeans and a polo shirt, and the host of the porn special was gussied up in knee-high boots and heavy make-up. And I also had a chuckle every time they mentioned women in executive positions of the porn industry being “on top”. I’m not sure if those things were worth noticing, or if they were a big deal to anyone else. Maybe I was thinking too much.

Maybe I should have relaxed, rolled one up, popped in a movie, and conducted my own research.

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